Messages are commonly used to exchange information among users on data-processing systems. A typical example is an electronic mail (e-mail) service, which allows exchanging e-mail messages (or simply e-mails) over a communication network (typically based on the Internet); the e-mail services make it possible to communicate anywhere in the world, thereby conveying information in a direct and immediate way.
Communication applications implementing the above-mentioned exchange of messages may be used for either personal purposes or business purposes. In the later case, the communication applications (together with other collaborative software, or groupware) contribute to define collaborative working environments (CWEs), wherein the users involved in common tasks collaborate among them to achieve their goals. This is of importance in modern organizations, wherein working in team is a key factor of their competitiveness. In this context, several techniques are known for facilitating the use of the messages; for example, in one technique the messages are analyzed to determine the context and meaning of a conversation, and linked contents relevant to the conversation are selected and associated with certain words or phrases in the messages.
However, sometimes the messages may be not completely effective in conveying the desired information to their receivers. Indeed, the actual significance of the messages (as intended by their sender users) may be distorted, misunderstood or not understood at all by the corresponding receivers.
The reduced effectiveness of the messages is typically due to the fact that the sender and receiver may interpret some expressions that are used in the messages with different meanings, or with no meaning at all (so that that may act on them in different ways).
An example of hindering factor that may undermine the effectiveness of the messages is the use of specialist expressions (such as of technical or legal nature), which may be very difficult to understand by receivers without the required skills. Another example of hindering factor is the use of jargon expressions relating to specific fields, which may be obscure to receivers alien to them. Another example of hindering factor is the use of context-depending expressions specific for particular situations (such as a meeting) or environments (such as a department), so that they may be incomprehensible to receivers without any relationship to them. Another example of hindering factor is the use of short expressions providing very poor explanations, which may be inappropriate for receivers without the required background. Another example of hindering factor is the use of ambiguous expressions that may have different meanings, so that they may be understood in different ways by the receivers.
In any case, the messages may be unable to generate the desired effects, at least in part, for which they were written (for example, causing actions, notifying events, communicating points of view, and the like); even worse, the messages may generate different or completely wrong effects as compared to the intended ones. This causes a failure of a corresponding communication processes, without the desired effects (or effects that are undesired).
Moreover, the messages that are not clear to the receivers may confuse them. In this case, the receivers typically request clarifications to the senders, which in turn have to respond to these requests of clarifications, and so on until the actual meaning of the messages have been completely clarified. However, this process is very time consuming and annoying for the users: moreover, it involves a proliferation of messages that are to be sent (and saved).
All of the above is exacerbated by the simplicity of use of the modern communication applications; indeed, this makes the writing of the messages faster and faster (especially for expert users, which tend to perform these operations almost mechanically), with a consequent reduction of the attention devoted to their content. Moreover, the substantially null cost of the corresponding services facilitates the proliferation of the receivers which the messages are sent to; this increases the likelihood of having receivers that are largely heterogeneous in the same messages.